Sarah: Second straight night without U.S.
Sarah: strikes on Iran — and Trump says he'll go right back to striking if the talks Tehran insists aren't happening fall through.
Sarah: Quick catch-up before we dig in: the U.S.-Iran channel was strained even before this pause.
Sarah: Mediators had been trying to push both sides back toward talks after the earlier strikes
Sarah: and recent reporting said they'd agreed on a roadmap in Switzerland.
Sarah: Then came a regional wrinkle: Mojtaba Khamenei publicly tied any deal with Washington to Israel ending its attacks on Lebanon.
Rich: This is Iran War Daily.
Rich: Today — everyone's calling the pause progress, even as Trump threatens to re-escalate.
Rich: And one line about sanctions from senior U.S.
Rich: officials quietly changes how the whole campaign looks.
Sarah: And ships are slowing through two chokepoints.
Sarah: Let's start with what's actually holding this pause together.
Sarah: CBS News writes:
Quote: President Trump expressed optimism to reporters Monday about diplomatic efforts in the Iran war, but he also warned that if the U.S.
Quote: and Iran can't make a deal, "we go back to doing what we were doing" when Washington was striking Iran.
Quote: - The Iranian regime insisted it is not engaged in any direct talks with the U.S.
Quote: but after three nights of relative calm
Quote: it acknowledged ongoing talks with Oman aimed at establishing "mechanisms regarding maritime traffic" in the Strait of Hormuz.
Rich: Trump says if talks stall, quote, "we go back to doing what we were doing."
Rich: And what exactly were we doing?
Rich: By CENTCOM's own account, running out of targets.
Rich: So he's threatening to resume a campaign that had already run out of targets.
Sarah: Let's separate those claims, because Washington and Tehran are saying different things.
Sarah: Trump sounded optimistic to reporters Monday.
Sarah: Tehran, that same day, insisted there were no direct talks with Washington at all.
Sarah: But here's what Iran will confirm: state TV says Araghchi worked the phones with Oman and Saudi Arabia.
Sarah: What they're actually negotiating is a mechanism for maritime traffic through Hormuz.
Sarah: So the pause is hanging on shipping-lane mechanics, with no grand bargain underneath it.
Rich: Right — the whole diplomatic track now rides on the mechanics of Hormuz, with Trump dangling a quick snapback over it.
Rich: Iran's held that strait since February 28th.
Rich: You don't fix a chokepoint that global oil runs through with three quiet nights and a phone call to Muscat.
Sarah: And look at the intermediary here: Oman, which has carried U.S.-Iran messages for years.
Sarah: Tehran can deny direct talks and still be talking, just through Badr Al-Busaidi instead of across a table.
Rich: Two governments describing two different realities to their own audiences.
Rich: One's selling optimism, the other's denying the room exists — and the ships are the only honest party in this.
Sarah: From Rachel Scott, Katherine Faulders, Shannon K.
Sarah: Kingston, Luis Martinez at ABC News:
Quote: President Donald Trump again put off his threats of a major military escalation with Iran in favor of diplomatic efforts to open the Strait
Quote: of Hormuz after senior advisers
Quote: including the vice president
Quote: voiced concerns multiple sources and a U.S.
Quote: official told ABC News.
Rich: So ABC takes us into the room where it happened: Friday
Rich: at the White House with Caine and Vance talking Trump down from the escalation ledge.
Rich: And Caine's reason? Munitions stockpiles.
Rich: We're running low on bombs.
Sarah: Let's be precise: Gen.
Sarah: Caine chairman of the Joint Chiefs
Sarah: told Trump the military could carry out those options
Sarah: but he also laid out the downside
Sarah: including depleting the stockpile.
Sarah: That's the uniformed military, according to those sources, flagging a hard constraint.
Rich: Right, and pair that with what we just heard — Trump threatening to go back to doing what we were doing.
Rich: You can't credibly threaten to resume a campaign your own chairman says is eating through the arsenal.
Sarah: And ABC says this fits a pattern: Trump threatens destruction, then steps back and cites diplomacy.
Sarah: What's new today is who helped pull him back — the vice president, in the room, voicing concern.
Sarah: Now we can put a name to one of the internal brakes on escalation
Sarah: and that gives the diplomatic track more weight than I'd have given it a week ago.
Sarah: CNN writes:
Quote: Iran may be better positioned than the United States to sustain a prolonged conflict because it retains a significant stockpile of weapons
Quote: while the US is expending high-end precision munitions that could take years to replace
Quote: military analyst Cedric Leighton told CNN.
Rich: Here's what actually moved this weekend: ship traffic slowed through both Bab al-Mandeb and Hormuz at the same time.
Rich: Captains and their underwriters are pricing this pause as fragile, whatever Trump's optimistic line.
Sarah: Look at how the headline frames it: Trump says the U.S.
Sarah: halted strikes at Tehran's request.
Sarah: That's his characterization.
Sarah: Iran's public line all week has been that it isn't in direct talks at all, so I'd put a big attribution flag on 'at Tehran's request.'
Rich: There's an even better line buried lower down: CNN's own analyst Cedric Leighton
Rich: says Iran's sitting on roughly two-thirds of its missile stockpile while we're burning through precision munitions that take years to
Rich: replace. So who's actually got the leverage in a 'prolonged conflict'?
Sarah: That fits with what we heard from CENTCOM: the campaign ran out of targets
Sarah: and now an analyst says the other side's arsenal was barely dented.
Sarah: Regional allies report no fresh Iranian attacks during the pause, so at least the quiet is holding on both sides for now.
Rich: And don't sleep on the Caspian — Ukraine hit an Iranian vessel, and Araghchi says it 'cannot go unanswered.'
Rich: Everyone's watching Hormuz while a whole other front just opened up a thousand miles to the north.
Sarah: From Axios:
Quote: Iran wants assurances it won't be attacked again by the United States.
Quote: It also wants money — both unfrozen assets and freedom U.S. sanctions.
Quote: Trump is wary of rewarding Iran for disrupting traffic through the strait and is demanding that Tehran surrender its remaining nuclear
Quote: material.
Sarah: The sharpest line in this Axios piece comes from an unnamed senior administration official: Iran wants the bombing to stop
Sarah: and it wants money. And, quote, they really want the money first.
Rich: Right — senior U.S. officials are now telling Axios that sanctions may do more damage than 13 straight nights of strikes.
Rich: That's a quiet admission the bombing underdelivered, and it's surfacing weeks in, buried under all the strike coverage.
Sarah: What caught me is the Hormuz piece.
Sarah: The proposal on the table would give Iran and Oman a role — and revenue — in managing traffic through the strait
Sarah: modeled on how Malaysia
Sarah: Singapore and Indonesia run the Malacca corridor.
Rich: And Trump's wary of paying Iran to stop choking the strait it was choking.
Rich: Meanwhile the same official admits some Iranians want the deal and others don't
Rich: which tells you this deal is caught in a faction fight inside Tehran.
Rich: This is a country with gasoline shortages sitting on some of the largest oil reserves on Earth.
Sarah: CBS News writes:
Quote: Iran's Revolutionary Guard's navy stopped six vessels trying to transit the Strait of Hormuz through routes not approved by Iranian
Quote: authorities state television reported on Monday. "Last night
Quote: six vessels that attempted to transit through a route other than the designated one were stopped by the IRGC Navy with warning shots and
Quote: turned back," a state television correspondent reported from the Gulf.
Sarah: CBS confirms a second consecutive night with no strikes, so the first pause wasn't a one-off.
Sarah: With both sides refraining again, Brent crude dropped almost 5 percent to $92 on the news.
Rich: Yeah, and remember Brent briefly touched $102 last week.
Rich: So the market's pricing the pause as real — for now.
Rich: But look at the other line in that same CBS report.
Rich: The IRGC turned back six ships in Hormuz overnight with warning shots.
Rich: Four on Saturday, six last night.
Rich: That's all during the so-called positive direction.
Rich: The bombing stops, and Tehran's still running the chokepoint like a tollbooth.
Sarah: Here's the distinction I'd hold onto: the strike pause is a decision by Washington and Tehran
Sarah: while Iran has effectively blockaded Hormuz since late February.
Sarah: Those are two different clocks.
Sarah: The pause doesn't touch the strait.
Rich: Which is why I don't fully buy the falling oil price.
Rich: Traders are betting on diplomacy, but nothing on the water has changed.
Rich: Somebody's going to be wrong, and it won't be cheap.
Host: Have feedback, a story idea, or a correction?
Host: Send us a note at iranwardaily at lantern podcasts dot com.
Host: We read every message, and it helps us shape Iran War Daily.
Host: We'll be watching the second half of the 60-day interim-deal window for any move from the Hormuz-management talks back to the nuclear file.
Host: We'll also track any further IRGC turnbacks along Hormuz routes after warning shots to see whether the pause is changing the blockade at
Host: sea. You’ll find links to every story in the show notes if you’d like to read further.
Host: That’s Iran War Daily for today.
Host: This is a Lantern Podcast.